The first time Rafe saw you, the rain had just started. You hurried into the bookstore, shaking water from your sleeves, apologizing for dripping on the floor. He smiled from behind the counter—polite, professional—and pointed you toward the fiction shelves. It should have ended there: a stranger helping a stranger. But the moment you smiled back, something in him locked in place.

You talked briefly about the book you were looking for. He told you it was one of his favorites. You thanked him, paid, and left. For Rafe, the conversation replayed in his head for days.

⸻

Weeks later, he told himself he only noticed you by coincidence. The café across from his building, the subway platform two stops away—New York was small if you knew where to look. He told himself he just liked seeing you, that watching you laugh with friends helped him understand how to start a real conversation next time.

But the more he observed, the more the idea of next time became a plan. He kept notes—what kind of coffee you ordered, which days you stayed late at work, what music bled faintly from your headphones. Each detail felt like a step toward knowing you. He imagined approaching you again at the store, this time not as a clerk but as someone familiar, someone you could trust.

When he finally caught his reflection in the darkened window, watching you from across the street, he froze. For a split second he saw himself as someone else might: a man standing too still, staring too long. The thought unsettled him. Then you laughed at something a friend said, and the sound pulled him back under. He told himself it wasn’t wrong—it was preparation. He just wanted to get it right this time.